Sebastian Vettel is back on pole position for the 31st time in his Formula One career after grabbing top spot on the grid forSunday's Bahrain Grand Prix. After a record-breaking 15 poles last season, Vettel has failed to get anywhere near the front row this season. The 24-year-old managed only a miserable 11th in China last weekend, his worst performance for 42 races. But from nowhere, Vettel and Red Bull have managed to find some speed this past week.

McLaren's Lewis Hamilton, pressing hard in qualifying, as he has done consistently so far this campaign, was forced to settle for second, 0.098 behind Vettel's pole lap of 1min 32.422sec, with the pair's team-mates, Mark Webber of Red Bull and McLaren's Jenson Button, on the second row in third and fourth.

"It's not been an easy start to the season, but what we have done here is what we expect from ourselves," Vettel said. "We've been busy working on the car, trying to find the right solution, with the boys hardly getting any sleep over the last four race weekends. They've certainly not had much here, but the car is much better and it's great to have just beaten Lewis for pole."

However, it was a qualifying session taking place against a backdrop of virtually empty grandstands in light of the unrest in the Gulf state that has overshadowed this event. Last weekend's debut race winner, Nico Rosberg, in his Mercedes could manage only fifth, followed by an astonishing performance from Daniel Ricciardo in sixth for Toro Rosso. Lotus's Romain Grosjean starts seventh, followed by the Sauber of Sergio Pérez, Ferrari's Fernando Alonso and Paul di Resta in his Force India. Interestingly, Force India were not shown once during the session by Formula One Management, who control the television feed and it has been suggested that this was in response to their decision on Saturday not to take part in second practice due to safety concerns. Kimi Raikkonen was dumped out of the top 10 by his team-mate Grosjean, who was third quickest in the session, with only half a second covering the pair.

After starting from second on the grid last Sunday in Shanghai, Michael Schumacher will be forced this Sunday to fight his way through the field from 17th after being knocked out in Q1. A combination of factors resulted in his surprise early exit, most notably a drag reduction system failure, but the seven-times world champion also made an error on his one hot lap and, although Mercedes clearly thought he was safe, it was not enough.

In the dying seconds, Heikki Kovalainen pulled out a quick lap in his Caterham and dumped Schumacher out, the Finn taking 16th place.